me to pay more attention to the names given me,
and especially to announce them more naturally. That command, uttered in
a loud voice at the door of the reception-room with unnecessary
brutality, annoyed me exceedingly, and prevented me--shall I confess
it?--from pitying the vulgar parvenu when I learned, during the evening,
what sharp thorns had found their way into his bed of roses.

From half-past ten till midnight the bell did not cease to ring, the
carriages to rumble under the porch, the guests to follow on one
another's heels, deputies, senators, councillors of state, municipal
councillors, who acted much more as if they were attending a meeting of
shareholders than an evening party in society. What did it all mean? I
could not succeed in puzzling it out, but a word from Nicklauss the
door-keeper opened my eyes.

"Do you notice, Monsieur Passajon," said that worthy retainer, standing
in front of me, halberd in hand, "do you notice how few ladies we have?"

_Pardieu!_ that was it. And we two were not the only ones who noticed
it. At each new arrival, I heard the Nabob, who stood near the door,
exclaim in consternation with the hoarse voice of a Marseillais with a
cold in his head:

"Alone?"

The guest would apologize in an undertone. _M-m-m-m-m-m_--his wife not
very well. Very sorry indeed. Then another would come; and the same
question would bring the same reply.

We heard that word "alone" so much, that at last we began to joke about
it in the reception-room; outriders and footmen tossed it from one to
another when a new guest entered: "Alone!" And we laughed and enjoyed
ourselves. But M. Nicklauss, with his extended knowledge of society,
considered that the almost universal abstention of the fair sex was by
no means natural.

"It must be the article in the _Messager_," he said.

Everybody was talking of that rascally article, and as each guest paused
before entering the salon to look himself over in the mirror with its
garland of flowers, I overheard snatches of whispered dialogue of this
sort:

"Have you read it?"

"It's a frightful thing."

"Do you believe it can possibly be true?"

"I have no idea. At all events I preferred not to bring my wife."

"I felt as you did. A man can go anywhere without compromising himself."

"Of course. While a woman--"

Then they would go in, their crush hats under their arms, with the
conquering air of married men unaccompanied by their wives.

What was th